Growing Together in Your Marriage

There is nothing more rewarding than to spend an entire life next to the person you love and pass the test of time. This is the ultimate level of commitment and fidelity humans are able to show. The concept of marriage has traveled a long way until our days, and many features have been updated, but the basic principles remain the same. Marriages that are built outside sincerity and with partial commitment have small chances of surviving till the end.

Expecting change and being open to change is the best way to keep your relationship in the same gear with your evolution as an individual. Nothing stays the same for too long and a marriage is far from being static. The capacity to adapt is crucial when changes occur at a fast pace, or involve significant events like having a baby or hitting a certain round age. In fact, change can “restart” the game, reveal renewed feelings and uncover the lost attraction.

During its lifetime a marriage will face challenges that will threaten its core structure. The best way to get prepared for events of this type is to simulate them by doing activities that share similar levels of stress and bring in focus new elements. The change of environment occasioned by long trips can be a great way to see how your partner acts outside home and with new people around. The high level of risk imposed by extreme sports or other activities can reveal more about a person than an entire life spent under the same roof. The new light brought in this way can show you different faces of the same person. You will either love this new stranger or keep the distance.

Compromise is the word that keeps the marriage on the right side of a thin line. A couple will face disagreement on numerous situations and the deadlock can be overcome only with one part giving up its claim. This needs to alternate between sides in order for balance to be maintained. Learning to compromise and accept can be very hard for those individuals that have expansive egos and high expectations and, for some, quite impossible.

Communication is essential in any human interaction, including a marriage and needs to come from both parts. Each partner needs to listen and understand the message, sometimes spoken without words. If you imagine the husband and the wife as two sides of the same river, then communication is the bridge between them. The shorter and wider it is, the easier is for thoughts and feeling to cross it. On the other hand, a marriage that struggles is facing either a long, narrow and in-stable cable bridge, either a burned down bridge.

Extended silence can be the worst enemy of a marriage. Thoughts and misinterpretations build up inside each one’s mind and when they are finally let out, they are already altered by the long wait. Much of the value of words comes from being spoken at the right time.

Learning to rebuild on ruins is the hardest part a marriage will face during its lifetime and definitely a decisive stage for its future. The myth of “tabula rasa”, or building from zero is not something you can apply to a real life scenario. There is no magic eraser that comes from nowhere and leaves you with a brand new white paper. There is no “undo” button. Yes you can make profound changes and commit to new habits but you need to know something. You can leave a place, you can replace objects, but you cannot change a human being. We have an inner resistance towards change that is perceived as an exterior threat. The older we are, the less open we are to new ideas and the more aggressive we become when asked to change. Change can spring from the interior, but it is always a painful and exhausting process. Rebuilding from where things are left can be seen as a way of accepting the other person as it is, instead of demanding a drastic change.

All above solutions for growing together in a marriage require patience, full involvement and an open heart and mind. Leaving the obstacles behind is, after all, what makes life so rewarding and beautiful.